[Life] The only opponent is oneself

Author: JEFFI CHAO HUI WU

Time: 2025-8-09 Saturday, 6:11 PM

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[Life] The only opponent is yourself

Before discussing "the only opponent is oneself," we must first clarify the definition of "opponent." Traditionally, an opponent refers to a person or team that directly competes with you, vying for the same goals, resources, or honors. In sports events, the other team on the field is the opponent; in exams, those whose scores are close to yours are opponents; in the marketplace, companies that conflict with you over market share are opponents. The core of this definition is that the goals and resources of both parties are set as limited, making the competition zero-sum—your win means my loss. Because of this, from the moment we are born, society, education, media, and family continuously instill in us the logic of competition—one must surpass others to prove one's worth.

This kind of indoctrination starts at a very young age. Kindergartens rank students, schools divide classes based on scores, workplaces allocate bonuses based on performance, and society ranks individuals by wealth and status. We are trained to become competitive machines, putting almost all our efforts into "being better than others." However, there is an overlooked fact in this logic—others have never been your true competitors in life. Winning or losing in competition is merely part of an external evaluation system; what truly determines your growth and happiness is not how many people you surpass, but whether you can continuously surpass yourself.

Many people spend their lives chasing the shadow of "external opponents," yet rarely stop to ask: If there were no artificially set rules for this competition, would I still strive so hard? This notion of "external opponents" is an illusion created by secular rules, capital interests, and group psychology. You are told to win over others, and thus continuously invest more time, energy, and money to achieve higher rankings and greater wealth, while neglecting the fact that this pursuit often has no endpoint. The excitement of winning is fleeting, and the frustration of losing is disheartening; emotions are completely hijacked by external wins and losses, completely deviating from the original intention of "friendship first, competition second."

In fact, most of the time, the only opponent we face is ourselves from yesterday. Whether you can be more composed, more focused, more at ease, and closer to the life you want today than you were yesterday is the true measure of victory or defeat. Golf is a typical example; in this sport, your performance depends more on your own concentration and stability than on your opponent's performance. It doesn't matter how many strokes others take; what matters is whether you can complete the course in fewer strokes. A friend of mine has been playing golf for decades, and his performance has steadily improved, but one day he suddenly decided to stop playing. When asked why, he said, "I can no longer surpass myself." This seemingly simple statement reveals the essence of self-competition—when you have already reached the limit of your abilities, no amount of external victories can bring satisfaction.

I deeply resonate with this point. Over the years, I have had opportunities to compete with others in various fields—whether in martial arts competitions, photography contests, or business negotiations and system design implementations—but I have come to realize that what truly gives me a sense of achievement is not defeating others, but repeatedly breaking through my own limits. For example, in the design and practical application of an extreme intelligent logistics system, I achieved real-time enterprise-level scheduling calculations using Excel 2016 on a regular computer, with performance even surpassing expensive ERP platforms available on the market. This was not to prove that I am stronger than any system, but to validate whether I could do my best under limited conditions; for instance, in my martial arts training, others are amazed that I can maintain the Golden Rooster Stance with my eyes closed for over twenty minutes, but for me, that is merely the result of daily standing meditation, breath regulation, and hip relaxation accumulated over time, a long-term struggle with my own body, breath, and mind; in photography creation, I continuously demand that my works include complete information such as time, GPS, altitude, and speed, not to compete with other photographers, but to make my records more complete and irreplaceable.

This way of thinking is almost heretical in today's society, where "involution reigns supreme." When the entire society is glorifying "winner takes all" and seeking validation through rankings, turning the attention back to oneself means refusing to participate in the games set by others. The Self-Determination Theory in psychology points out that the most enduring motivation for humans comes from autonomy, competence, and relatedness, rather than external rewards and punishments. Competing with oneself and focusing on inner progress, rather than constantly comparing with others, is the path to achieving lasting satisfaction.

In reality, the culture of competition creates countless false demands—higher scores, bigger houses, more luxurious cars, higher titles. It makes you believe that only these can prove the meaning of your life, but once you attain them, you will find that the sense of satisfaction quickly fades, and you begin to search for the next goal, falling into an endless cycle. This cycle is essentially driven by external "rivals" rather than true self-motivation.

True growth is not about how many people you defeat, but about whether you are becoming better. You can set your goals on improving your health, mindset, or abilities, or it could be learning a new skill, finishing a good book, or improving a relationship. Every self-transcendence, no matter how small, is a victory. And this victory does not lose its value just because others are stronger than you.

The best state of life is not to always win, but to understand that one does not have to win all the time. Being free from worries about food and clothing, enjoying good health, and getting along well with important people are the true happiness that is worth protecting. Most of the grievances in the world stem from conflicts of interest. Acquiring possessions that far exceed one's needs requires time and energy to manage, and even leads to new conflicts in order to keep those possessions. Such gains and losses often cause people to lose the essence of life.

If you see others as your only opponents, you will be led by their trajectories and rhythms; if you see yourself as your only opponent, you can live according to your own pace. Ask yourself every day: Am I more at peace today than I was yesterday? Am I more free? Am I closer to my inner goals? If the answer is yes, you have already won the most important match. True freedom is stepping out of the games set by others; true victory is no longer needing to win.

I practice alone, not to compete or seek victory, but to improve just a little compared to yesterday's self.

Source: https://www.australianwinner.com/AuWinner/viewtopic.php?t=697157